Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard upgrade works on Tiger 10.4 machines

This is somewhat controversial because it is against the Apple EULA, but apparently you can save $140 if you’re a Tiger 10.4 user and run the 10.6 Snow Leopard upgrade without a problem. To make things even more interesting, popular Mac writer Walt Mossberg actually recommends that you do this if you are a Tiger user. So it’s really up to the end users, either save money and upgrade directly, or go the other route and you’ll be out $140.

Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard is a great upgrade and it’s one I would highly recommend installing on any compatible Mac. The fact that you can save a lot of money by upgrading directly from 10.4 is a huge bonus.

I bought Snow Leopard upgrade today. I own a Macbook pro with intel core 2 duo. I tried doing the upgrade from Tiger and it doesn’t work. Installation will get stuck during boot with gear spinning. I’ve tried different steps from pressing C key and option key. It will not work from Tiger to Snow Leopard upgrade, will need to get the Box Set.

[…] have too you’ll really appreciate this guide. When upgrading Mac OS X to a new major OS (say, upgrading Tiger to Snow Leopard) you may notice that some MacPorts installations get screwy and no longer work… but no […]

I own a macbook pro with intel core 2 duo – purchased in mid 2007. on advice from a mac representative at my local best buy store – i upgraded from tiger 10.4 directly to snow leopard 10.6. (I DID NOT purchase the box set. and it WORKED for me). no problem with install or operation. I also purchased the wireless keyboard and magic mouse at the same time, upgraded the software to get optimal performance for this hardware…things WORKED fine. I also added another gig of RAM to up my system to 2 Gigs. This was a great choice. I could now run multiple programs like Adobe Illustrator, PhotoShop, EyeTV, and iTunes simultaneously without issue. Then, i got greedy and upgraded iTunes from 9.0.2 to 9.0.3 and things started to get wonky. iTunes started to play songs slowly. music wasn’t garbled, it just played slow and therefore out of tune. and my magic mouse started to jump around and delay motion. so i reinstalled snow leopard 10.6 (over the existing install of it) and now iTunes 9.0.3 works fine. I DID NOT download and reinstall the upgrades for the wireless keyboard/magic mouse yet. I want to enjoy having iTunes back for now. But when i do download and reinstall the wireless upgrades I’ll update my results here. ***has anyone else out there experienced this problem???*** Also, i’m a little confused. before iTunes started to act up, i check my system and my OS X showed that I had version 10.6.3 installed. how is that possible? as of today, 2/2/2010, apple isn’t offering that version on their site. i’m confused.

I have owned a Imac for about 2 years and I tried upgrading straight from tiger osx to leopard osx and it wont let me get updates i need for a few things one inparticular is java, the message it gives me says i need mac os x 10.5 or higher…and “supposedly” I have 10.6 …no offence, but thanks to this guide i ended up paying more because I still have to buy the box set!

c. NO Neocoyote says:
September 4, 2009 at 9:28 pm
I bought Snow Leopard upgrade today. I own a Macbook pro with intel core 2 duo. I tried doing the upgrade from Tiger and it doesn’t work. Installation will get stuck during boot with gear spinning. I’ve tried different steps from pressing C key and option key. It will not work from Tiger to Snow Leopard upgrade, will need to get the Box Set.

There seems to be great controversy over whether it is possible to upgrade to 10.6.3 from 10.4.11 at all legally or not.

I was told that you need a Intel processor in order to run OS Snow Leopard on Mac, is that true? I have a Power Mac G5 and it does not have a Intel processor, can I still install the full version of OS Snow Leopard over my OS Tiger?

I have the first generation intel mac with 10.4 on it and i tried to upgrade to snow leopard with the upgrade disc from the apple store and it was a no go! Guess i have to get the boxed set as well correct? Anyone…..

The problem is to do with the type of OSX – Tiger was for PPl and Intel, and if you instal SL on top of Tiger, you leave a lot of clobber on the Hard Disk, which you don’t ever need again.
So the recommendation makes sense: do a clean instal from scratch, save your self a lot of HD space [SL occupies less space than Tiger] so it is neater and faster.

Hi.
I’ve got a MacBook Pro from may 2007, running Tiger, but want to buy the new iPhone 4g. Turns out you need 10.5.8+ on you Mac for it to work… I’m quite a newbie to all this “upgrading/changing” OSX so got a question. My sis bought a new MacBook Pro couple of weeks ago and it includes the Mac OS 10.6.3-install dvd (and app. install dvd).
Will I be able to use this DVD to upgrade my own system/get rid of Tiger and get (Snow) Leopard? The DVD isnt locked to my sis’ mac right and I’ll be able to install it on mine too, or? (is the 2 install dvd’s the “Box set”?)
Anyone?

i bought the iphone 4 today and got home to find it wont work with my 10.4 software so i went an bought snow leapord like the woman from apple told me too and i just tried to install it but i dont have enough RAM in my computer so i now have a 2 year iphone 4 contract and i cant put any of my music, photos or apps on my iphone

Marco, you just mangaged to come across unhelpful and smug in the same sentence, congratulations! Keep it up! A few hundred on a new phone is in more peoples reach than a couple grand on a new laptop.

Selena, it seems like at best, a pretty major oversight, or at worst a cynical method of extracting more cash from the faithful mac following… I have friends who have also had to spend a further £130 on upgrading to snow leopard. This was not explained to them in any way shape or form when they purchased the phone.
The phone works just fine on XP, but no Tiger? Hmmm.

After losing my main laptop i am now using an old 12″ G4 Powerbook running tiger as my itunes server, and my 3gs currently syncs just fine with it… So whats the deal with the iphone 4, theres no point in me getting it until i upgrade my laptop, so for now Apple, sorry – i’m out.

Its a shame that Apple, a company that was seen for years by many as ‘the good guys’ are now slipping into the ruthless money grabbing tactics of its old rivals M$.

Same thing happened to me with the new Nano I bought two months ago. I didn’t realize that it requires ITunes 10 but you can’t install 10.0 without having at least OS X 10.5 (I still have Tiger 10.4.11). Apple said I had to buy the box set OS X 10.6 for $160 or I could return the Nano for a fee of $15 to restock it. Argh! I happen to also have a good old PC so just copied my music there and Windows Vista is compatible with ITunes 10 and syncs my new Nano just fine. It’s just a hassle to have my music in two places. I still have the original IPhone. Guess I’ll bite the bullet and upgrade everything when Lion comes out.

Does anyone imagine for a moment that any ‘loopholes’ by which Apple are deprived of £160 (for a family pack boxed set), won’t be plugged?

I’m sure some people will try this and then claim “It worked”. Those for whom it didn’t work probably can’t even get onto the net anymore to announce it ;-)

It is quite a hit but with 2 Macs to upgrade from Tiger I’ve decided to go by the route which doesn’t leave me in breach of Apple’s EULA and puts me in a situation whereby any problems I experience are most definitely not caused by the pseudo-upgrade

I’ve just placed an order for the mac box set 09 – Can you guys believe I still have my Powerbook G4 and it’s almost been a decade!!! I’ve been a big apple fan till the moment I purchased the 1st iPhone 4. Same problem with my macbook tiger os x 10.4.11

I recommend purchasing the Box Set as this avoids extra cost in the long run. Mine cost £79 inc. Vat and p&p on ebay.

I guess apple are now just as good if not better then microsoft so now they started monopolizing the market…

What do you mean “avoids extra cost in the long run”?. I just did a quick and dirty upgrade from Tiger to SL using the $29 disc and so far so good. Just wnated to keep my old macbook going for another 6 months and use my iPhone4. What could potentially happen??

Nothing will happen! Its just iMAC bummers that dont feel its right to break the rules trying to make you panic! As long as your OS X is running and operational then why worry? If it does malfunction then you re-install the OS X again …. VOILA!

Hi, I have an iMac OS X, Intel Core Duo, 2 GHz, 512 memory. I purchased the box set to only find out that I could not install it, because it said I did not have enough memory or RAM? So I am now stuck with this $169 box that I cannot use. When I went to the Apple store I gave them the hardward info? So Can anyone tell me what I need to do to upgrade my computer from tiger to snow leopard. Where would I purchase memory, the Apple store said they could not help me. I would have to go online and fine some place????

look for Mac memory on ebay. I took my 06 mackbook from 1 GB to 2 GB for a mere $50.00 and free shipping. I’m not sure about your imac but I installed mine in less than 10 minutes 4 years ago and no prob

Same problem here – just bought iPhone 4 today, running an older iMac Intel Core Duo with 10.4.11; can’t get the iPhone going. What’s worse is that the SIM card now can’t go back in my old phone as it’s the new micro SIM. Don’t have a phone, can’t get the iPhone going and bl**dy Apple OS is incompatible – even though I have iTunes v9.2! You’d think that was all that matters…?! Come on Apple…

Yes I agree my daughter have researched and asked some friends apparently the snow leopard was rather rushed into production and isn’t that brilliant OS it is rumored that in the summer 2011 that a better OS ‘lion’ should be a better OS ? Does anyone know this ? So will we be rushing to buy this for wrong reason. I think we should hype up this and fuss it to the newspapers or gadget mags so Apple will have to act quickly because soon there will be a lot of media attention I think the public has a right to be aware of this especially at the incredible enormous profits of apple last year. What would be “right and honorable” would be for Apple to arrange not only an apology but some kind of disc with comes to the iphone Users for free or even a small amount of say £20 built purposely for iphone 4 users with this problem as of course Apple would not like to offer this totally free in case people don’t buy their new OS to use on their desktop.

In case anyone else is having this issue with iPhone4 and Verizon (like myself) I was able to activate my phone with someone else’s iTunes or you can go to the Verizon store. You just don’t sync it. Verizon has an app that will load your contacts from the old phone if you have them backed up to their site. The only thing I’m lacking is my iTunes music, other than that I’m not needing iTunes for the phone to work.

So… I went to the Mac Store yesterday and the guy handed me a Mac OS X Snow Leopard disc. $30. Loaded it into my 2007 MacBook Pro Intel Core Duo running 10.4.11. Absolutely no problem. As far as I’m concerned, if the guy at the Mac store gave it to me and told me it was OK I don’t have any issue with it. You only need the box set if you’re going to use all the iLife crap.

Hey Ian, I ordered only the disk from the apple website 3 days ago. I’ll be getting it shortly, and I’ve seen some really good reviews about going from 10.4 tiger to 10.6 snow leopard but a few bad ones. I’ve had my macbook since christmas 2006: it has a 1 gig ram, lots of gigs in the hard drive, and i’m almost positive it meets the requirements. I’m just worried that I’ll need this “box set” if the disk only doesn’t work. I don’t wanna waste my money on that crap. Thanks

Similar problem here. Bought a new IPOD for my wife and now my MacBook needs to be upgrade from 10.4.11 to 10.5.8 (or higher) to be able to run iTunes 10.x
I’m going to use the update disc and see how it goes.
Feeling locked into un-expected expenses now that I’m not willing to work with machines loaded with MS.

I also just got my new iphone 4, but didn’t want to upgrade my system to SL for $160 since I will probably be getting a new computer in about 4 months. I went to the apple store, and the guy there told me “unofficially” that this should work and that the only reason they didn’t advertise it was the EULA. I just finished backing up everything important and I guess I’ll find out tonight if this works or not. On the plus side, the apple store guys said that if anything didn’t work they would take back the disc for a full refund.

I haven’t anything helpful to add here only if upgrading a car was as complicated as upgrading a Mac we’d all be riding around in horse and carts.

Isn’t it time Apple (and Microsoft for that matter) just offered a sensible product and something that does what it says on the tin.

Blimey, computers weren’t invented yesterday.

(I own three Macs – 2xTiger 1xSL and I dread the day I go for the upgrade. At least my Blackberry works so I’ll forget the iPhone – reading people’s experiences here makes the computer world look ridiculous)

I’m going to piss in the wind on this one. I hope I dont get wet! But, I know with PC (yes I have a MacBook Pro I5), you can update the bios and other firmware. In the past, when you updated the bios, it would allow to upgrade the memory. The programming limits the computers on what hardware you can install. By updating the firmware, this will tell the bios that, there is an added feature, hardware and so on. If the RAM slots are compatible, then you can possible upgrade to twice the capacity of the original parts. Now, this theory holds true with PC. Mac uses the same hardware as PC, just a programming difference. I know there will be limitations, but there are always file upgrades all over the internet for this.

I hope this helps other to think and read more about the things they can do. I am new to Mac. I only had one since May and learned a great deal from my experiences with PC. I hope to find more information and provide it, once I have tested and tried it.

Also, get mobile me, for iPhone users. You can upload your contacts on there, you can manually transfer songs from any computer without a problem of contacts of other sync related info. In other words, you can take your friends songs and have them on your phone, but you cant put them on your Mac, still learning that feature!

One, thing I did want to ask. This site has some good info. My friend has a MacBook from I think May 2007. It originally had Tiger. It is at least 3 to 4 years old I think. I cant remember the OS, But I am unable to mount the external hard drive with the os x on it. I was trying to back up the files, but again, it will not mount. I was thinking about installing the image on one of the partitions and see if I can get the files to open. The os partition is unable to be scanned and fixed on SL. I don’t know if it is because of the changes in the os of SL.

Anyone had a related problem and was able to gain access of their files and obtain them?

The problem was, there was a faulty power cable that would cause the computer to shut down during operation. Now, it won’t even allow the Mac to see the external firewire hard drive. It says scan and back up the files. I even tried loading the tiger.dmg file. No game. Seems like a unbeaten board on Super Mario Brothers!

i have had the same problem, i have just purchased an iphone 4 and found out that i cannot sync my phone to itunes as it uses tiger 10.4 then had to go back to the shop so they could get my phone working for me . the funny thing is that they have a pc . ironic i have a mac book pro . although i like apple i am wondering if i have made a mistake . now i went to upgrade to sl as the man in the store says you can use snow leopard without buying the box set , well it didnt install.i have been running round all day and now i need to buy the box set, well if i had know all this i would not have brought my phone 4 . it should have information for the iphone 4 requirements . i will seek an apology from apple as this is bad for their image, as many comments i have read here let alone the people who not bother complaining

I too have now had problems with the SL upgrade form Tiger 10.4.11. Didnt work first time around, have done the clean install as advised in many advice forums, is still stating that it needs 10.5 or higher to install SL.

I’ve read into this in some detail and upgrade seems to work fine for some people and not for others, but yet there doesnt appear to be a response explaining how to get around it for those who have problems. I have a MBP from 2007.

Glad to see there are so many other Mac converts feeling a little duped.
No longer will I celebrate, sorry gloat, to all PC users about how good my Mac is as quick today as it was when I bought it in ’07 and PCs tend to fall apart after 6 months!

So, Tiger to Apple TV is causing me the same iPhone 4 problems… do I buy the £25 upgrade to SL (as advised by trusty Apple Store adviser), or use 10.5.8 Leopard software CD that arrived with another Mac machine? More chance of working than taking the latest OSX upgrade??

I have an intel iMac with 10.4.11 and a mac book with 10.5. I received iLife ’11 and need to upgrade to 10.6 to be able to use it. It sounds like I will need the box set on the iMac, can I use that to upgrade the mac book also?

i bought i mac book pro from 2007 with a 2.16 intel core 2 duo 2 GB of ram and 160GB of HDD. it was running os 10.4.11, i went to the store and ask the “genius” to sell me the 29 dollar SL upgrade he asked me what os i was running and he said it wasn’t going to work. so i told him its ok ill give it a try if it doesn’t work im out 30 bucks. so after browsing around the internet i found this video on youtube. basically just saying that you should back up and do a clean install of OS SL.
i followed his instructions and everything went smoothly.
took about 45 minutes for the installation to complete. but i was able to install the new 10.6.3 OS. just updated to 10.6.5 btw.

I have an old ibook g4. Running tiger. It is in tip top shape, so I feel I need to keep it until it poops out on me. I just got the ipod touch 4g. Like everyone else, I need to have itunes 10.4 to run my ipod touch 4g.

So, is the final verdict that we can go from tiger 10.4 to snow leopard 10.6? It seems people are going back and forth on it.

I upgraded from 10.4 to 10.6 and had it on my core 2 duo laptop for 6 months but eventually realised that it had serious problems – it was very slow. Just reinstalled 10.4 and my mac is alive again.

My guess is that there are some parts of the system that don’t get upgraded by the 10.6 upgrade, because they are the same as 10.5 (but not 10.4). Without these upgrades 10.6 just struggles or does not work!
Iin retrospect I would not have tried this route and feel a little peeved at those who suggested it without fully knowing what the implications were (of course I did take the risk). The best solution now seems to upgrade to 10.5 and then use my 10.6 disk, or to buy the full 10.6 package.

Quote “The best solution now seems to upgrade to 10.5 and then use my 10.6 disk, or to buy the full 10.6 package.”

ehh… you do realize that the $29 Snow Leopard Upgrade disk is, in fact, a full install disk ?
In other words… They may label it as an upgrade disk but you can use it to do a fresh Snow Leopard install on as many Mac drives as you wish.

Hi I too am absolutely disgusted and appalled from this problem I ordered an iphone 4 upgrade from 3gs I spent 2 hrs from various departments even to apple technicians they advised me that for £30 I can upgrade to snow leopard from tiger (10.4) currently using when I tried ordering online applestore I found out that it was not appropriate and I would have to buy the mac box package of £122! So the iphone cost £262 for 32 GB now becomes £384 not to mention another year tariff with O2. The silly sales team should have and obliged to firstly advise people to check first with applestore or technicians prior to this. O2 will arguably blame apple for the ridiculous con price and apple will blame O2 sales team being not trained properly. Technically since the phone is not working it is faulty gadget and must be returned and refunded.
The cheek that the technicians told me to use a PC which will download itunes 10.1 for free without the hassle of needing wasting £122 extra seems a real blow to us Apple loyal users the other problem would be the hassle of transferring all the apps ,songs, videos, etc from MAc to PC if this is even possible. So maybe Bill Gates is laughing at us now and Steve Jobs oops once again has not thought of it properly again!
So I hope all those potential buyers of the new iphone 4 to take care and consideration first to save yourself some money and hassle. I undoubtedly will fuss this to O2 and Apple as if the hike in vat and petrol isn’t bad enough for us poor hardworking people.

Yeah, good luck with all this. I called Apple customer support this morning about this issue of OS 10.4 and needing 10.6 to run the latest iTunes so that you can update your iPhone to the latest OS of that. The guy was just like, “Yeah, Apple isn’t doing anything for people in this situation.” He then suggested installing 10.6 from the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade disc. But he also added that he didn’t see any specs on our iMac (one of the first Intel releases from back in like 2005) that would indicate if it would work or not. Kind of surprising that someone at Apple would tell us to break the EULA, because then what happens if it doesn’t install properly? Then we’re just poop out of luck?

It’s even more highly aggrivating that the latest iTunes runs on Windows but not 10.4! Seriously? And the fact that Apple is offering nothing to current 10.4 owners is just terrible customer relations. Have they become so greedy that they can’t allow a free upgrade to at least 10.5? It’s just ridiculous. Why should I have to pay anything extra to be able to run the latest iTunes and to update my iPhone?

So yeah, not sure if we’re going to gamble and try upgrading from 10.4 directly to 10.6. Our 10.4 iMac has been working like such a champ for the past 5-6 years. It’d be a shame to go and ruin that. Shame on Apple for putting so many of us into this position.

I totally agree with Jayadeva as I am myself in the same situation. I have had a brilliant Apple imac 10.4 osx tiger edition for 5 years; but if I want to sync my iphone 3gs with itunes – I have to spend £168 on the full snow leopard and a 2gb mem module.
Yet I can upgrade itunes on my pc laptop.
Shame on Apple for being so greedy and disloyal to their customers. I was going to buy an apple ipad, but now I guess I will not bother. Upgrades should be free for god’s sake.

tiger works well for my needs, not to mention that photoshop 7 won’t work on leopard, not mention that just by losing that I’ll have to expend hundreds of £€$ on an upgrade for that, not to mention that on principle I won’t upgrade when they do give support to xp users.
I have vista and tiger, yet I can’t sync with an apple os. plain stupid…
iphone is going back to the store…

I just bought a new iMac and had an old one that I wanted to update for my kids. I tried to use the snow leopard disc that came with my new one and it will not work on the old computer. Do I need to purchase a new disc for the old iMac?

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